We are way overdue for removing the term “pro-life” from the American political lexicon because their policies are literally killing us. Just take a look at the state of Texas: it’s home to the most extreme anti-abortion laws in the country and the highest maternal mortality rate in the entire developed world. Unsurprisingly, those two facts are very related. Despite this, the state legislature failed to pass anything to address this—and the next working session isn’t until 2019.
A University of Maryland study released last year found that Texas is particularly egregious in its maternal mortality rate; the state’s rate doubled between 2010-2012. In fact, the increase was so sharp that the researchers had to analyze Texas completely separately since it’d throw off the overall data. Look just how much of an outlier the trend was to the researchers (emphasis mine):
There were some changes in the provision of women’s health services in Texas from 2011 to 2015, including the closing of several women’s health clinics. Still, in the absence of war, natural disaster, or severe economic upheaval, the doubling of a mortality ratewithin a 2-year period in a state with almost 400,000 annual births seems unlikely. A future study will examine Texas data by race–ethnicity and detailed causes of death to better understand this unusual finding.
This information came out in September 2016, which gave Texas politicians enough time to learn about the urgency of this trend. Unfortunately, they continued on their death parade: state legislature made time to debate and pass more extremely unethical and harmful anti-choice laws, but they couldn’t be bothered to pass one bill to address the high rates of pregnancy-related deaths. For an example, take a look at what happened to a bill designed to address pregnancy and birth-related deaths among Black Texans. Via the Associated Press:
State Rep. Shawn Thierry sought to look into one particularly disturbing trend that the Texas task force had found: Black women make up 11 percent of births, but 28 percent of death. Thierry, a Democrat from Houston, wanted to compare the risk of black women in different income brackets.
But Thierry's bill - which was backed by the Texas Medical Association and American Heart Association - died along with a parade of other proposals after tea party-backed lawmakers, protesting a lack of movement of their own pet issues, used a House procedural maneuver to kill every bill on a legislative calendar that wasn't supposed to generate debate.
"We haven't done enough," Thierry said.
It’s going to be a long (and deadly) wait until Texas legislators even have a chance to get their act together and reverse this appalling trend within their state. Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced a special session that’ll begin on July 18—but his priorities are anti-abortion measures. Once again, the GOP continues to prioritize death over life.